Story submitted to Readers Digest – A typical day in Jail

Well, it’s almost noon.  I’m sitting here waiting for the guard to unlock my door, after which we’ll be herded up to the kitchen, like cattle, for our noon-time meal.  I’ve no doubt that we’ll be served some sort of potato - mashed or baked, or scalloped, or cut into wedges.  Here on P.E.I, there’s no escape from potatoes; every day they’re on the plate.  Along with the potatoes, there’ll be some canned vegetables (if their can opener ever broke, we’d be in serious trouble … or would we?), and some low grade meat (is there a Grade C? … Grade E? …) oozing with grease.  Around here, grease is one of the main food groups, it seems.  Hopefully, there won’t be any hair in the food today.  Around here, you almost have to shave the food before you eat it (the health inspector doesn’t wander into these parts too often). 

After we eat, the guard will come around with a basket to collect the silverware.  I’ve been in here so long (13 months) that this almost seems normal to me.  I think I may be getting institutionalized, God help me!  If the numbers add up (the silverware) we’re going back to the unit where we’ll be locked in ‘till our next meal (and if they don’t add up, out come the rubber gloves).

Not much to do here except watch Jerry Springer, or Jenny Jones, or one of the other trashy talk shows that are so popular amongst the inmates.  Either that or wait for the daily newspaper.  But theres eighteen guys and only one paper.  If you get it first you’re ok, otherwise, it comes in bits and fragments … oh, ‘scuse me, I have to go get some clean clothes (we get these three times a week).  Everyone wears the same outfit, different numbers (I’m #93), sweatpants and tee-shirts. But you can’t have any more than two sets of clothes in your cell.  Otherwise, they’ll take them and charge you in their ‘kangaroo court’, where the inmate is invariably found guilty and sent to ‘the hole’.  Why they fear us having too much clothes is something I don’t understand, it is just the way it is.

I received some mail this morning, a calendar from a college in Ontario.  I am taking some correspondence courses.  It’s the only way you’re permitted to educate yourself in this incubator of crime.  We’re not even allowed to have books, magazines, newspapers (except the local paper which is provided to us), or even crossword puzzles brought in.  They call that contraband.  That’s something else I don’t understand.  But that’s just the way it is…

We have a small library here, but most of the books are smaller than I am (I’m 33).  If we’re lucky one of the guards will bring in a newspaper, maybe the Halifax Chronicle-Herald or the National Post, and leave it behind when he goes home (that’s the only way to get ‘em).  You see, there’s some good guards and some  …. well, you understand.   Same as any other profession, I suppose.  I spend most of my time reading anything I can get my hands on… or sleeping.

I spend most of my time reading anything I can get my hands on … or sleeping.  If there’s nothing else to do (and often there isn’t), you can always sleep.  You see, there’s not much focus on rehabilitation, whatever that is, in here.  They just want us to watch television and stay out of the way (like children).

It’s evening now and we’re on our way to the kitchen, again, for potatoes, again, and some kind of … slop.  Everyone in here, it seems, is fat; too much greasy food and not enough exercise.  No point complaining though, that’s just the way it is…

After supper, there’s nothing for us to do, ’cept watch t.v. or sleep.  Some nights they have an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, but I’m in max (maximum security) and the max inmates aren’t allowed to go to AA because … well, I don’t know why and that ‘s just the way it is … Nobody has the answers around here, so we’ll pass the evening hours watching Seinfeld reruns and other sitcoms, maybe a movie, if we all can agree on one.  Nothing to look forward to tonight but lock-up at eleven and the end of another day. I think I’ll read for a while and then wait, maybe an hour or two, for the guard to come in and turn out my light.  You see we don’t have light switches in our cells.  The guards have to do it for us.  Why that is, is something I don’t understand.  That’s just the way it is ….